English was introduced to me by my sister Valeriana. She is 5 years older than me, and we have always had a strong bond, always playing and doing things together. I could say that she had a powerful impact on my education as well. Since I was a child, I wanted to do everything she did and English was her favorite subject at school when we were younger. I clearly remember her arriving at home after school and her teaching me basic English words and phrases like "my name is Vinícius" and "Nice to meet you". We had a lot of special moments together trying to sing songs in English and translating them using Google.

Later on, this previous contact helped me to get better grades in school without so much effort. For those who don't know, studying English in Brazilian public highschools is mandatory, but let's say that the quality is not so high. No one finishes high school speaking English fluently, and I do not blame teachers for that, but that's a whole new story.

In contrast, Brazil is so embedded with English words, anglicised, so I grew up surrounded by words like fast-food, spoiler, fitness and milk-shake that helped me to build vocabulary over time, but I really buckled down and started studying English actively when I got into University.

At this time, I moved to a student house, actually the biggest student house in latin America, where I met a lot of people from different parts of Brazil and even from other countries. At some point I realized that there weren't boundaries at all, and English was more than just a subject at school, it was a tool to communicate with the world.